Most web content is generated in real-time by a web server. For example, a search engine server may provide results in response to a search query by locating web pages that relate to the query, generating a page containing those results, and delivering the results page to the user's computer for display on the user's browser.
While the content of the results page is customized based on the user's input (i.e., different queries will generate different results pages), the presentation of the results usually is not customized. Typically, search engines deliver all results in a set format—e.g. a text list containing the titles of the ten results that best match the query—and there is no opportunity for the user to change the format or other aspects of the presentation. Most web sites, such as E-commerce sites, portal sites, etc., suffer from this lack of flexibility in the manner in which content is presented.
Different users may wish to view certain types of content in different ways. For example, some users may prefer the conventional text-only format of search results, while others may prefer each web page listed in a set of search results to be accompanied by a thumbnail image of the page. In some cases, a given user may prefer different presentations depending on what the user is searching for (e.g., the user may care more about thumbnail images when searching for web sites about movies than he does when searching for web sites about ancient Greek literature), or based on some other circumstance (e.g., the user may want to turn off data-intensive thumbnail images when accessing the Internet via a slow dial-up line). Conventional web sites, however, do not allow the user to change back and forth between different presentations or “views” of content.
In view of the foregoing, there is a need for a system that overcomes the drawbacks of the prior art.